THE CAPTURE AND TRIAl, ^ 

op A 

r 



(Confederate 



Sent to Ohio by Jefferson Davis. 



I 



I 



THE 



fepture and Trial of a (Confederate Spy 

Serit t0 Q\\[Q hx JeffersGfi Davis. 



A PAPER 

READ BEFORE THE OHIO COMMANDERY 

OF THE 

MILITARY ORDER 

OF THE 

Loyal Legion of the United States 

KEBRUARY 2, 1887, 

BY COMPANION 

LBWIS H. BOND, 

Brevet Major U. S. Volunteers. 



CINCINNATI: 

H . C. SHERICK & CO. 

1887. 



IN EXCHANGE 
JAN 5 - 1915 



THE 



Capture and Trial of a Confederate Spy 

SENT TO OHIO BY JEFFERSON DAVIS. 



Among the most notable events of the Revolu- 
tionary War were the capture and execution of Major 
Andre. History, in pathetic language, relates how 
that young and talented British officer died upon the 
scaffold for the part he took in the treachery of Bene- 
dict Arnold, and we are told that so deeply did these 
occurrences impress themselves upon the minds of 
the people that Congress voted medals of gold, in- 
scribed with the motto, " The love of country con- 
quers," to the three militiamen — Van Wert, Paulding, 
and Williams — who had, out upon the Tarrytown 
Road, made Andre their prisoner. The State of Ohio 
has made the memory of these men perpetual within 
her borders by adopting their names respectively for 
three of her northwestern counties. 

During the late war of the Southern Rebellion the 
loyal States were infested with many spies and 
emissaries of the Confederate authorities; but it is a 
matter of which the nation should be proud that, 
among all her armies of two millions and ahalf of men 
no Federal General was ever found base enousfh to 
imitate the example of Benedict Arnold. Blunders 



may have been committed, but the traitor's sinister 
bar was never placed upon the escutcheon of any 
officer of the Union Army. 

During the year 1864 there occurred in Ohio a cap- 
ture which in interest equalled, if it did not exceed, 
that of Major Andre. 

Lieutenant Samuel B. Davis, of the Confederate 
Army, a relative of Jefferson Davis, was sent by him 
on a secret mission to Ohio. He was a young officer, 
twentj'-four years of age; tall and slender, and pre- 
possessing in appearance. His father was a Presby- 
terian minister, residing in the State of Delaware, of 
which commonwealth 3-oung Davis was a native. 
Lieutenant Davis, prior to his appearance in this State,' 
had served upon the staff of General Winder, in charge 
of Andersonville Prison, and had in consequence be- 
come known to some of the Union soldiers who were 
incarcerated there. This fact played an important 
part in his subsequent detection and trial. 

Disguising himself in citizen's clothing, dyeing his 
hair, and securing a British passport under an assumed 
name, young Davis entered upon his perilous under- 
taking. Making his way from Richmond, Va , to 
Baltimore, Md., he traveled from thence to Columbus, 
Ohio. How long he remained there, with whom he 
communicated, and what he communicated was not 
fully known at the time of his trial, although sufficient 
information was obtained to justify placing a number 
of persons under surveillance. Leaving Columbus, 
Lieutenant Davis traveled on the cars to Detroit, 
Mich., passed over the Detroit River to Windsor, 
Canada, and there communicated with Jacob Thomp- 
son and other Confederate outlaws, who were making 



— 5 — 

war upon our Government from the territory of a 
neutral power. After remaining in Canada a few 
weeks, he re-crossed the river to Detroit and returned 
to Columbus, and in a few days thereafter took the 
cars for Baltimore on his return to Richmond. 

Up to this time fortune had favored him. He had 
escaped detection, and, having fully carried out the 
instructions he had received from the President of the 
Confederacy, was hopefully looking forward to the 
promotion and honor which was sure to follow upon 
his return. How soon the brightest prospects are 
dimmed! At Newark, Ohio, two private soldiers of 
the Union Army took their seats in the same car that 
contained the Confederate officer. A moment later 
and one of them whispered to his companion: "Jim, 
there's Lieutenant Davis, of Andersonville; " and, im- 
mediately approaching the Confederate, said: " Arn't 
you Lieutenant Davis?" "No, sir; my name is 
Stewart," was the reply. " Yes, you are Lieutenant 
Davis, and you had charge of the prison when I was 
in Andersonville," said the soldier. By this time 
nearly everybody in the car had gathered around the 
two men, and Lieutenant Davis, seeing that conceal- 
ment of his identity was no longer possible, said: 
" Well, boys, you have got me. I am Lieutenant 
Davis." A few minutes later he was in the custody 
of the Provost Marshal at Newark, and placed 
for security within the Newark Jail. Before his 
incarceration he had been searched. Nothing was 
tbund upon his person save his money and watch 
and chain. He was placed in the main room of the 
jail with a number of other prisoners who were 
gathered around a stove. As soon as the Provost 



— 6 — 

Marshal had taken his departure, Lieutenant Davis 
removed his coat, ripped open the linings, and, taking 
out a number of dispatches and drawings which were 
written upon white silk, consigned them to the flames. 
Subsequently he was removed to Cincinnati, and 
confined in the old prison known as the McLean 
Barracks. Charges of being a spy were preferred 
against him, and by order of the Department Com- 
mander, General Joseph Hooker, I was ordered to 
report as Judge-Advocate of the Court-martial which 
was to try him. The Court-martial convened in the 
old building nearly opposite the National Theater on 
Sycamore Street, and Lieutenant Davis, upon being 
arraigned, pleaded " not guilty of being a spy," but 
"guilty of being a bearer of dispatches." Then fol- 
lowed the introduction by the prosecution of all the 
evidence that could be obtained to show that the 
prisoner was not in any military sense a bearer of dis- 
patches. The Judge-Advocate argued that the 
prisoner was within the Union lines in disguise, and 
where he could have obtained valuable information 
whether he did or not, and that these facts made him 
a spy according to the laws, customs, and usages ol 
war. Lieutenant Davis offered no testimony to show 
the contents of the documents he had burnt in the 
Newark Jail, nor did he reveal any fact that would 
throw light upon the object of his mission. He did 
propose to show by the testimony of Jefferson Davis 
and J. P. Benjamin that he was sent as a bearer of dis- 
patches, and not as a spy; but the Court-martial held 
that the testimony he desired to obtain would not 
change the admitted facts of the case, even if true, 
and declined to grant a continuance for the purpose 



of obtaining the testimony of the chief of the Con- 
federacy and his Secretary of State. 

It is customary in Courts-martial, after the evidence 
has been heard, for the prisoner to make his statement. 
Lieutenant Davis arose for that purpose. He paused 
for a moment and scanned the faces before him. 
There sat the rugged, stern-visaged veterans of the 
Union Army, some of them with empty sleeves. No 
sympathetic glance returned his ow^n. His doom had 
overtaken him, and he realized it. Yet, with a forti- 
tude and courage that was sublime, he addressed his 
judges as though he was speaking not to them, but to 
posterity. I remember a portion of his address. 
Said he: "I fear nothing on this earth. I do not 
fear to die. I am young, and would like to live; but 
I deem him unworthy who should ask pity of his foe- 
men. Some of you have wounds and scars. I can 
show them, too. You are serving your country as 
best you may. I have done the same. I can look to 
God with a clear conscience; and whenever the Chief 
Magistrate of this nation shall say ' Go,' whether upon 
the scatfold or by the bullets of your soldiery, I will 
show you how to die." 

Just before the Court-martial retired for consultation 
upon their verdict and sentence, he shook hands with 
each member, and said he did not expect to meet 
them again on earth. The court found him guilty of 
being a spy, and sentenced him to be hung. He was 
taken immediately to Johnson's Island, and a day set 
for his execution. An account of his trial appeared 
in a leading newspaper of Cincinnati, together with a 
report of his remarks. They excited great attention 
throughout the State. Wm. T. McClintick, Esq., 



— 8 — 

President of the Cincinnati and Marietta Railroad, 
who knew the father of Lieutenant Davis, interested 
himself actively to secure a suspension of his sentence. 
An appeal was finally made to President Abraham 
Lincoln. Senator Saulsbury, of Delaware, wrote to 
the President : " You know I am neither your personal 
or political friend, but Senator Douglas once told me 
that you were a kind-hearted man. Read the inclosed 
speech of this young officer condemned as a spy. 
There is nothing like it in history save Robert 
Emmet's. I ask you to act in this matter as the 
President of the Uuited States should act." 

The day appointed for the execution was near at 
hand when Lieutenant Davis wrote to me from John- 
son's Island. He said: "Having heard of my sen- 
tence, and also knowing that the 17th inst. is appointed 
as the day of my execution, I write in order to give 
you time to grant the request of a dying man. The 
court of which you are the Judge-Advocate having 
sentenced me to be hung, at least grant the request of 
one whose days are numbered. I desire that, if pos- 
sible, one or more members of the court will come 
and witness m}^ execution. Take this as the request 
of one about to be launched into eternity. Come 
and see it done, and you shall at least have the satis- 
faction of knowing that you hung a brave man. Be 
kind enough to answer this hasty note. It is not 
written through disrespect, but for the reason I have 
already assigned." 

It illustrates somewhat the spirit of those days to 
quote now, after twenty-two years have elapsed, my 
reply to this strange request. I said: " Your wish 
that one or more members of the court which sen- 



— 9 — 

tenced you to be hung may be present at your execu- 
tion will be granted if possible. As Judge-Advocate 
of the General Court-martial which pronounced the 
sentence of death upon you, I gladly avail myself of 
this opportunity of saying to you that, by your manly 
conduct and heroic bearing under the most trying 
circumstances, you have won the respect and excited 
the admiration of your foemen. A sense of duty to 
their country alone actuated the members of the court 
when they found you guilty of being a spy; and I 
assure you it was with feelings of regret and sadness 
that I conducted the prosecution against you — regret 
that one so young and brave should deem it right to 
assist in the destruction of his native land, and sad- 
ness that it was my duty to prove him guilty of an 
offense which merits and receives an ignominious 
punishment." 

Preparations for the execution were fully made, 
and the prisoner looked forward to the morrow as his 
last day on earth. The commandant at headquarters 
on Johnson's Island had retired for the night when he 
was aroused by a messenger bringing an order from 
President Lincoln directing that the execution be 
suspended, and the prisoner sent to Fort Warren. 
In this fortress Lieutenant Davis was kept securely 
imprisoned until the Southern Confederacy was a 
thing of the past, when the Secretar}^ of War — Mr. 
Stanton — very reluctantly directed his release. 

It was more than twenty years after the events 
herein related had occurred, while sitting in m}^ office 
in Cincinnati, a stranger presented himself before me, 
and, extending his hand, said: "I presume you do 
not remember me; my name is Samuel B. Davis."' 



lO — 



Seating himself at my invitation, we held a long and 
interestins: conversation. While Lieutenant Davis 
talked freely about the events of the past, he did not 
disclose the nature of his mission to Ohio during the 
war. When he arose to take his departure, I said 
to him: "Lieutenant Davis, will you not tell me 
before you go why you came to this State in 1864? " 
Said he quietly: "That is a secret that will die with 
me." 



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